"What are your plans this weekend?" Albus asked as the two were leaving their care of magical creatures class. He, as most of the school, had been in a great moon that day when they woke up and to see the first trip to Hogsmeade had finally been announced.
Scorpius smiled at him coyly, reaching out to lace their fingers together, "I'm pretty sure my boyfriend is taking me to Hogsmeade."
Albus agreed, smiling at him. It had been a while since he had been to Hogsmeade; it had been even longer since he had gone with a date and not just friends. He was very much looking forwards to going out to the village as well, since his sweet stash had been running low for a while now and he was starting to get bored of looking at the castle walls and seeing the same faces every day.
"Juno insists that we have a 'bonding of mutual friends' drink though. She's been complaining about having to catch me up on what I miss every other lunch."
"Bev has been pretty much the same way," Albus said, rolling his eyes. The couple had been switching which tables they sat with at lunch for the past week, agreeing to eat at their own house tables for dinner. He wished that they would sit together every dinner too, but Scorpius remained firm on being separate; their assigned tables made it easier for communication between prefects and between quidditch teams. Instead, they met after dinner to study for their N.E.W.T.s, when there weren't prefect patrols or quidditch practice. Well, for Scorpius to study and for Albus to distract them when he got bored. It was unlike him to have his homework done days before it was due, and he wasn't about to put anymore effort in than usual just because the library was Scorpius' favorite place to hang out.
Scorpius squeezed his hand as they arrived at the place they would have to part. "I'll see you after dinner," he said, leaning down to kiss him on the cheek before turning down the hall for Transfiguration class.
Albus made his way down to the quidditch pitch to set up for today's practice. They had their scrimmage against Ravenclaw the previous night, and Albus was ready to coach his team based on what he saw and what Rodger Davidson pointed out to him. It was a very difficult scrimmage, but it was made easy by being able to see Scorpius in the stands studying with Juno Patil.
Today they would be working on their fundamentals. They would start out flying though an obstacle course that he set up, then some catching and batting practice, then Albus would walk them through the new workout that he wanted them to do daily. Just an easy practice.
His hopes for that practice were dashed, however, as he showed up to find the Hufflepuff team already on the pitch. Emilia Parish flew down to him when he marched out onto the field.
"Potter!" She called out, not bothering to get off her broom as she hovered just above him. "I'm sorry, but I need to pitch for a bit longer."
"It's booked for my team this hour Parish."
"I know, but we've got our match against Ravenclaw tomorrow. We're just not ready yet."
"Well I don't care," Albus said, crossing his arms, "My team is just as unready as yours is."
She glared daggers at him and pointed her beaters bat at him, "If you had picked a better team, we wouldn't be stressing out the way we are. Let us have the pitch."
"No, I'll still be practicing during my schedule" Albus said, holding firm as he saw his team start to trickle out of the locker rooms, "I'll tell you what. I'll keep my team grounded for the first half of the hour, but only if you agree to a joint practice before our next game."
"Deal!" Parish said, and then flew off to join the rest of her team. Albus sighed and turned to his team, "Alright, warm up run, twice around the track!"
.:.:.:.
After practice, Albus debated putting off the shower in an attempt to persuade Scorpius to a bath tonight but decided against it when he saw his shirt was covered in sweat. Instead, he would try to tempt Scorpius out of studying.
Arriving at the Great Hall, Albus went over to Scorpius and draped his arms across his shoulders.
"I thought we agreed…" Scorpius started before Albus cut him off.
"I'm not sitting here, just asking if maybe we could hang out somewhere not so quiet later. Like the courtyard or something? And maybe we could leave the books behind just once? Please." Albus sagged into Scorpius, hoping the added weight would show just how tired he was and aid in his persuasion.
Scorpius thought for a moment, his hand coming up to rest on one of his arms, "Fine, just this once."
"You are the best!" Albus said, wrapping his arms around the Ravenclaw for a quick squeeze. "I'll see you after dinner!" He gave him a quick kiss and then ran off to his proper table, waving at Juno when she rolled her eyes at his antics.
When dinner finally ended, the two boys met up and made their way to one of the courtyards. There was a breeze starting to blow in and the torches had been lit to give light to the area. "So much for this being a less quiet place" Scorpius said when they saw that nobody else was in the area.
"It is!" Albus said, sitting on one of the benches and pulling Scorpius down next to him, "I don't have to watch my voice here, and we don't have to worry about any librarians telling us to separate."
"I suppose," Scorpius said, leaning onto him. Albus smiled and wrapped his arm around Scorpius's waist, "How was your practice?"
"Fucking terrible." Albus paused, "I mean, it was fine, but Parish annoyed me," Albus launched into a rant about how the later part of his day went before he asked Scorpius how his went, which led to them talking until curfew, picking fun at each other the whole time. Albus sighed as the warning bell rang through the halls.
"I don't want to leave," Albus sighed, pulling Scorpius tighter to him. They hadn't been officially dating for more than a week and Albus just wanted more time to hang out. He hated curfew, he just wanted to spend more time with his boyfriend.
"How about I walk you to your dorms?" Scorpius said, patting Albus' arm for release.
"Won't that make you miss curfew?"
"I can be bad," Scorpius shrugged, managing to escape his grasp and sanding up, "Besides, I can just say that I'm heading to cover a patrol, or that I got caught up in the library."
Albus grinned and shook his head, "I'm not corrupting you, am I?"
"It is far too early for you to be doing that, Al. Come on, get up."
Reluctantly, Albus let himself be pulled up and was glad to have the company on his walk to the dungeons. They walked in relative silence, holding hands. Albus couldn't keep his eyes on the route they were taking, glancing over at Scorpius every so often. He was still a bit stunned that this had happened, that he was dating this boy who liked him and who didn't seem to want anything extra from him. At least, Albus hoped he didn't. He had experienced far too many people try to be close to his family because of their status, and he had his fair share of people come up to him with the obvious intentions of bagging a Potter. He hoped that wasn't the case for Scorpius, that this wasn't just some ploy.
It couldn't be. Scorpius had never seemed to care. He had always treated him as just another regular person, had said on many occasions that he didn't care what people think. Albus believed that, but he couldn't help but have doubt. His last real boyfriend had only been using him, and he didn't see the signs until it was too late. He didn't want the same thing to happen again.
"What's got you all twisted up?" Scorpius asked as they rounded the corner into the dungeons.
"Oh," Albus turned and smiled at him, "Nothing really, just, er, quidditch."
"Oh, alright."
"And, uh, maybe you want to sit with me at the match tomorrow?"
"No," Albus' stomach sank as he heard the answer, but Scorpius continued, "You're sitting with me. It's my house playing, after all." Scorpius bent down to kiss his temple, and relief flooded though his body.
"Yeah alright. But on one condition," Albus smirked up at him, "you got to kiss me right now, and every…" Albus was cut off as Scorpius lips found his quickly but started to pull away, realizing there was more to the sentence. Albus didn't let him go though, and pushed the boy against the wall, trapping him. He continued to kiss him, his hands sliding down to rest at Scorpius' waist, feeling's Scorpius' arms move to rest on his shoulders. He didn't stop until he heard some giggling behind him. He pulled away to see some third years dart into the common room.
"Er, what was that second condition?" Scorpius ask him, his face turning red in embarrassment.
"Oh, that you would also have to kiss me every time your team scores." Albus winked at him, gave him one more quick kiss, and then pulled away for the common room, "Goodnight Scor. I'll see you tomorrow."
.:.:.:.
The next day was a beautiful day, perfect for a quidditch match. It was hard to focus on any classes that day when there was a match today and Hogsmeade tomorrow, well hard for everyone except for Scorpius. Albus smiled as he watched Scorpius' quill jot down every detail from across the room. Occasionally he would catch the Ravenclaw glace up to look at him, only to deeply blush and quickly turn back to his notes. He would have to get those notes later, Albus thought, remembering the one's that he had been given a few weeks ago.
As soon as class ended, Albus made his way to Scorpius, only to wait on him as he talked to the professor about something. After about a minute, Professor Splint indicated to Scorpius that someone was waiting on him.
"Oh," Scorpius turned towards him and smiled, "I forgot to tell you I have a small meeting after class. I'll meet you in the stands? Get me a sandwich maybe?"
Albus rolled his eyes, agreed to the request, and walked out of the classroom, only somewhat annoyed that their time together was taken away.
When he got to the Great Hall, Albus took the time to round up his own team for dinner. "Try and pay attention to whoever plays your position on the other teams. Enjoy the game, but if you see anything you want to try, just let me know and we can do that."
After his team meeting, he made a couple sandwiches for Scorpius and asked Bev if she wanted to join him in the Ravenclaw stands.
"Yeah I can sit with you and the dorks today," she grinned, teasing him, and then they were off towards the pitch.
They settled down next to Juno, who waved at them before she continued to scan the crowd. Albus and Bev talked while they waited for the stands to fill and the game to start. He was starting to wonder just how late Scorpius was going to be with Juno suddenly stood up and waved. Albus looked up to see that Scorpius had finally arrived just as the teams were walking out onto the pitch.
"Took you long enough!" Juno said as Scorpius sat down next to him, "How'd it go?"
"Oh, it was fine. I've got a lot of work ahead of me though," Scorpius turned to Albus, "did you happen to remember my dinner?"
"Yeah, I've got it right here," Albus pulled out the sack dinner that he had made, then pulled out a couple of bottled drinks to give to everybody, "how did what go?"
"It's nothing," Scorpius said, stuffing his face with the sandwich, "Just a meeting with Professor Splint about the different programs I can join after Hogwarts and their qualifications. We picked out the three that I wanted to try for, as well as two backups and then discussed what essays I would write for each prompt. Then we laid out a timeline for when I should have everything done and when I should hear back. Once all of that is done then we will get to set up visits to campuses and everything else. I'm really excited for it."
"Nerd" Juno and Bev said at the same time, causing Scorpius to blush a bit and duck his head.
The game started, and the group started watching. Albus was surprised at just how into the game Scorpius and Juno got, cheering along with the crowd and yelling at the other team as they flew overhead. Every time Ravenclaw scored, they would stand and yell with their arms raised, and then Scorpius would turn to Albus and give him a quick kiss, before turning his attention back to the game.
The game only lasted an hour before Ravenclaw caught the snitch, causing half the stadium to stand and cheer, the final score ending in 80 Hufflepuff, 210 Ravenclaw.